This page features up to two poems a month selected by CPS Web Master from poems submitted by members of the Connecticut Poetry Society - Previously published poems are allowed with publication information. Posting your poem here is considered "previously published" for many submission purposes. Use of these poems without the authors approval is unauthorized. Future poems posted here will only be displayed for a limited time.
These following poems are from the CPS Haiku Chapter for the month of November
The theme for December is "light" or write about whatever you like
Send ONE Haiku only-AFTER December 1st - The deadline is Noon December 15th. You need not follow 5-7-5 form
Sent to Tony Fusco tfusco357@gmail.com
The theme for December is "light" or write about whatever you like
Send ONE Haiku only-AFTER December 1st - The deadline is Noon December 15th. You need not follow 5-7-5 form
Sent to Tony Fusco tfusco357@gmail.com
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These following poems are from
the CPS Haiku Chapter for the month of October eyes closed my lips yearn sweet apple pulp tart stings tongue ah no paper wasp Ellen Hirning Schmidt ____________________________ twisted vine horror ghosts grounded in loving conversation. Peter Ulisse ____________________________ Leaves turn bloody red– That is a dumb thing to do– Why not just stay green? Victor Altshul _____________________________ costumed spirits gone candy wrappers on the lawn shriveled pumpkin faces Tony Fusco _____________________________ Poetry surrounds us. All you and I have to do Is listen for it. Larry Zimmerman _____________________________ The aggravating delight Of trying to touch Abundance and ephemerality Caroline Lodewick ____________________________ riding through the rain what’s left of maple leaves Marita Gargiulo ____________________________ First frost: a yellow warbler whistles on a blackened vine. Judith K. Liebmann ____________________________ Allhallows’ Eve The jack-o-lantern’s Glowing eyes light the darkness Ghostly forms appear. David G. Boston ____________________________ Writer Something inside said yes, of course it’s important, and leave it alone. Gwen North Reiss _____________________________ wrapped in dewy silk a purple beetle struggles between the dry leaves Deborah Casey ______________________________ autumn meadow grass rustles against my passage burrs coming with me Ed Ahern _____________________________ shadows float in sky moonlight flickers through the trees silence is eerie Patti Fusco ____________________________ "Baiku" Painted pedals falling Their green stems, pitted with age Autumn's fleeting ride Ethan D'Orio _____________________________ sitting far apart lightening scatters glass entwined anew Janet Geoghegan ____________________________ Fall's falling leaves blow which way, north, south, I don't know colors flying by. Gloria Jainchill ____________________________ Howlers moon rising heart speeding, hunting rhythm I’ve become the wolf Amy Graver __________________________ A tap on smooth nail investigating the thumb no, no ladybug Mary Hills Kuck __________________________ October color, A riot in land and sky; One last fling, then white. Dorene Anne Sullivan ____________________________ life, meaning's language fluency is happiness walk over this bridge Karl Traichel ---------------------------------------- We are fools to think There are ghosts to see beyond The barren landscape Cynthia Santostefano Sharr ___________________________ Summer is no more A few staggered, mournful chirps October cricket Terri Yannetti ____________________________ giant spider -- not as scary as the dark web Suzanne Niedzielska _____________________________ Crimson face is round. Crisp nights in grove all favor puckered face. Stephen Corbeil _____________________________ a mouthful of late summer raspberries the sting of an earwig on my tongue Deborah Howard These following poems are from
the CPS Haiku Chapter for the month of September stone Buddha robins pooping on your head crowned in white Robert Giebisch apple falls delicately on Eve's tender cheek lips sweet harvest juice Peter Ulisse heavy branches bow filled with ripe juicy apples their scent perfumes the air Patti Fusco Summer slips away Leaving us no choice but to Bend for fallen apples Cynthia Santostefano-Sharr Apples Tell me again how You got out of that ticket My dear Granny Smith Caroline Lodewick Mcintosh laden branch Just within reach of tiny hands On daddy’s shoulders Tony Fusco Apple cobbler a remembrance of sunshine on my tongue Doreen R. Oshinskie spotting an apple core the high flying bird circles back Marita Gargiulo gather windfall fruit playful serendipity storm season manna Jan Geoghegan Standing at the shore watching the oyster boats dredge Seagulls glide overhead David Boston "Harvest Season" Thirty days has Sep tember; I'm getting old; that's all I remember by Donna Marie Merritt Red leaves first tell me Next, birds of every kind, scream A breeze cools my cheek. Ed Lent An Apple a day Brightens my teeth so they shine My smile aligns. Gloria Jainchill One September night I kissed your mouth and felt bliss; Winter never came. Dorene Anne Sullivan Holmberg Orchard Apple picking time- again I reap the fruit of another's labor. Charlie Ewers flying ants emerge scooped mid-air by sparrows- twilight harvest Deborah Howard Baskets of apples Ripe, ready Begging to be bitten Alisa Parcells once sweet rose petals dazzled eye enchanted nose now sungleam hips call Ellen Hirning Schmidt Orchard Revel apples to comfort a few drops of refreshment sweet September high Rachel Larensen What harvest remains Tomatoes, sunflowers, corn Edge of town farm stand Amy Levitin Graver These following poems are from
the CPS Haiku Chapter for the month of August I am wary of stars
are they always for our secret wishes or omens in the dark Cynthia Santostefano-Sharr Cats day now ended She jumps to bed, curls tightly A soft moon in sky -Ed Lent Night softens the wrinkles of this day Doreen R. Oshinskie from the old Chevy station wagon mom points out Orion Marita Gargiulo Sleek Darkness have you no pride, midnight your tail full of dusty stars Curled at my head, you purr Rachel Larensen false night of twilight sunset slips into green flash birds flee to rookeries Tonty Fusco coffee dregs in the cupholder -- long night’s drive Suzanne Niedzielska Overnight A spider's web Dreamcatcher between branches Alisa Parcells weightless and vanishing spun of dust and impermanence- night moths Deborah Howard fireflies, crickets play no need for human scripting theater under stars Karl Traichel Square black stars Broadcasting night’s wild calls. Bedside’s best neighbor. Amy D'Orio 2024Emory Jones
DIVINE SCULPTURE He sculpts the earth with water, wind and fire, Sends the roiling stream, cutting soil With force of rushing flowing water Sends sand to sculpt the sandstone with the wind. Through this sculpture garden glides the wind As sun beats down on desert, hot as fire That spreads like a shallow river across the earth And like molten silver beneath the water. Up in the mountain over rocks, the water, Rippled by the fingertips of wind, Resists the glowing warmth of orange fire To cool the surface of the waiting earth. The rocks in pinnacles arise from warming earth As now the flowing river gives its water To natural bridges, carved by rushing wind, That arch and leap as if they were on fire. He blesses earth, refreshes it with water And on the wind renews eternal fire. Saskia Sommer
“You’ve grown” Increments specked across a patronizing white stadiometer indicate that as seasons passed and Branches turned Betrothed, Brittle, Bare- Bones of mine stretched And my joints rewired. now, i’m an eighth of an inch more than what I used to be. “I’ve grown” Grown into the soles of shoes my toes never quite touch The tip of it all- Through the Tying Then untying of laces i stay bound to the size i’ve succumbed to and yet, I am growing. growing at a static standstill silently shouting soft, similar songs and sulking in the soliloquies of simpler times. “We’ve grown” Skin stretched knuckles knocked and we retreat to a retrospective view, when the sun could not burn us quite so well and the specks, freckles then, Served as Subtle refuge from Goosebumps, Giggles, And the Giddy echo of youth. I look to my little sister. “She’s grown!” I proclaim, astounded at how her eyes now meet mine; She is Sweeter and stronger than she was So I let her coming of age slip my mind because small sisters and saccharine safeties Make me short again. Waning Whispers Warn me We were girls then and Women tomorrow and somehow, I am growing - still. John Sembrakis The earth takes one year to travel around the sun. The earth takes 24 hours to complete one revolution. an electric field determines the electric force given off by a particle. The strength decreases with distance. Even a dwarf star contains millions of stars. Doppler effect is a motion induced charge in a wave length of a wave. Diamonds are the hardest substance known to man. Some people oppose the space program. Calculus is the method of measuring an area under a curve. Einstein was not handsome. "Everything in moderation" . (The Golden Rule). God becomes happy when a evil person becomes good. He said "I want a goddess". The other said "Are you a god?". Emory Jones
DEEP FREEZE I am not going to say it is cold, But when you milked the cows, They gave ice cream, And you could knock over Any frozen goat. The chickens hatched penguins, And the horse snorted Ice-sickles. The windows of the house Glazed over, And as the inside heat Melted the ice, It became running rainbows. The thermometer Plunged to ten below zero, And the trees exploded Like cannon shots. Now that was cold, And if you believe me, I will tell you another Tall tale. 2023
Janet (Jan) Geoghegan
BACK AND FORTH Away from here In a space Unknown Ever. Amorphous Nameless No cards A no one. The some ones And somethings Of my world Revealed. Invisible, A voyeur, I choose... To return. Stephen Corbeil
The widower opens an old bin with cards and missives — recalling languid beach days, collecting sea glass and fireworks at the docks. Donna’s glowing scent escapes the bin and competes with percolating coffee. The widower salvages a brown paper sack entwined by ribbons and pierced by homemade cards. Her rose-red squiggle reads “Enjoy, I love you”. Saved as a first packed lunch and con Amore. The bag’s wrinkles meet tears, its pouch stained and torn. Upended, salami, cheese and chocolate chips of long ago spill and disappear like water poured into water. As he pours his coffee, he composes a note to place with the empty bin on the curb. “Please take and store your longings so you may enjoy them later. The Widower”. FIRST-COMERS Polly Brody
Man, entered the western hemisphere with fire and Stone Age weapons; the glacial age lands teemed with animals whose evolution had been apart from Homo. In a few millennia they were extinct. You mammoths: shagged hulks who barely stepped aside at first, panic now before their clever fire driving you toward ravines and fatal plunges. You steppe-ponies: fat rumps inviting butchery, stampede screaming confusion within the circle of their ambush. Your kind will not again set hoof here until your second coming, bearing Spaniards. You ground sloth: slow herbivore large as the mighty bear, how you swing your stunned head above this rabble, as honed stone drives into your liver. And you great-antlered caribou: migrant as dependable as the sun, jammed tight with your calves into rivers, how your tangled racks clatter while you buck in bloody froth. Lion incisors dangle like scimitars from the shaman’s medicine bag, bear pelts keep naked bodies warm. Megabeasts dwindle, the People flourish. In the voids they create, they invent gods of fur and horn, shapes remembered in mind’s dark negative. first published in The Midwest Quarterly The Owl
It’s the owl, a particular fowl, The perspicacious one; Known as wise, some do surmise, More seen when down the sun. Birds of a feather flock together, Yet all sorts not the same; Birds of Prey, the live long day, Their nature’s not to blame. In flight by night, great calls to fright, A shivering shriek gets 'em running. Sets way up high, downdrafts from sky, A mastery of spy & cunning. With eyes aglow, a darkness so, Solemn stare gives glare to headstrong. Cries of the night, hidden from sight, Postured perch portends soaring song. Full range to head turns mice in dread, Wary rabbits take rest from run; Keep watch above, not safe a dove, Take guard for an awaiting sun. Craig Matheson THE FALL Polly Brody
Their lineage descended, ceding Edenic forests' easy fruits to their long-armed cousins. Through millennia, penumbral and volcanic, their kind colonized the arduous plains. One pair must have trekked through slurried ash that cast their footprints for a later age to read. The larger led the smaller, who had paused, stepped aside. A backward glance, perhaps memory of green in her mind? They lived with need and daily competition: snatched ripe remains from vultures, stole plover eggs and sandgrouse chicks, watched the cheetah, slick with speed, bring down gazelles. Necessity’s percussion forced imagination across the brain’s rift valley toward the first spear flung, and toward self-conscious understanding. Now they knew, before the lion’s rush, absent the leopard’s claw, knew the valley of shadow each day travels. They arranged their dead, knees to chest, no longer let them lie in careless discard. Axe and awl put by those rigored hands. Within deep caverns, Shamen painted their desires: the spear’s true strike ordained, auroch and deer brought down. Walls imaged their prayers and their magician wore antlers. Polly BrodyUNSOILING
They're cleaning the Coliseum with power hose and brush, even toothbrushes to scour limestone's tiny fissures. From crevice and façade, they plan to cleanse the gunk urban centuries overlaid, in particular our last eleven automotive decades' hearty contribution. With the grime of ages scrubbed away, will ancient blood stains reappear? Will power wash and abrading bristles bring to light that early gore on walls and columns? Will ghostly emanations rise from new-sanitized stone tiers that once supported rumps of multitudes cheering carnage? Tourist, linger not overlong within this amphitheater revitalized, for one might hear the wakened grunt of lion or rasping snarl of leopard. One might hear the shuffling chains or clash of mailed fist on armored breast, the cry of "those about to die" tremor anew the hollow air. Polly Brody
(Honorable Mention: 2023 Nutmeg Contest) WITNESS At the pharmacy drive-through, my idling glance noticed you poplar sprout you, foot-high youngling whose tender not yet woody stem has put out six spring-fresh leaves. You, born of chance seed, perhaps in dove guano, dropped into just enough rain-washed detritus lodged in that roof gutter. The encoded future that you carry promises a sky-reaching mast, stout and straight, canopied in wide-palmed, fingered green. But there’s scant provision in that gutter. Your rootlets will not sink deep into loam but soon will cramp against aluminum and dearth. Perhaps a year more you will add a few inches and another half dozen leaves, then starving will wither you. My mundane pause in queue has made me witness to your doom. I carry your small, brave start away with me. |
The page is open only to CPS members Submit your own original poems using the on line form which you can access by clicking on the button. Previously published poems are also welcome. Send only one poem no longer than 60 lines.
October 2024
Sarah Blanchard among the flock Uninvited a neatly dressed young man smiles over my porch railing tells me how he used to raise chickens too. His conversational gambit is a cold open a feeble hook line sinker meant to cast a long and loosely strung filament nothing to do with poultry. Considering the convolutions of his inspirational ramblings, I keep a watchful eye on my frenzied hens digging for worms in the manure heap. Idly I ask him if his god will protect this flock from the bobcat I saw last evening by the river. He says just shoot the bobcat and in christ all things are possible so I know he’s not listening. I offer him my shotgun but he’s already turned away, disappointed by a heathen with no time for false raptures and last year’s apocalypse. These following poems are from
the CPS Haiku Chapter for the month of August August Night
A sky full of stars -- Look! One streaks through the blackness To rest on Earth forever. Dorene Anne Sullivan City Nights You sleep tenderest New York, you have kept me watch, Warm on this cold block. -Komo Ananda Feeding Bring out the hay bales. The cow's warm breath fogs the air, They gather to feed. David Boston The Pool After Dark A stroke underneath Brush the moonlight reflection Summer night swimming By: Caroline Lodewick leaves reflecting sun darkness falls on distant orbs lacy trees of morn Jan Geoghegan dust disappears from den books trees outside window ghostly pacing in middle of night. Peter Ulisse middle of the night eyes wide open, mind racing not sleeping again Patti Fusco My body listens For night sounds that come from you Do they need a soul? Larry Zimmerman perfect peach, first bite its skin still holds the suns warmth ripened summer nights Amy Graver Lake hills silhouettes darken as storm clouds slide in front of stars and moon. Stephen R. Corbeil STONE WALLS
Recluse walls of stone, with their enigmatic beginnings. They lie passively, part of the earth they transgress. Criss crossed lines of place and time. Stone by Stone, no two the same. Laid up one by one, giving strength both to wall and builder. Set as artificial boundaries to separate you from me. Lasting long beyond their creators and purpose. they rest as monuments to a forgotten past. Yet, ever an expression of timeless strength. W. Stuart CPS Haiku Chapter: September 2023
Catching fireflies
then letting them go the ease of childhood Sylvia Forges-Ryan __________________________________________________________________________ my worst poems, haikus stale trite lines, old awful work all need Never-Be Karl Traichel __________________________________________________________________________ mountain vantage point sun on wing tops leap in faith fly to the horizon Tony Fusco _________________________________________________________________________ we used to twist and shout now we zumba -- tango is the dance for me Suzanne Niedzielska __________________________________________________________________________ anticipating deciding what will bring joy so many choices Patti Fusco __________________________________________________________________________ before stepping on the scale everything comes off bra too, because every ounce counts ~Amy Levitin Graver __________________________________________________________________________ ascending in the tempest slick with fallen leaves the last stone steps Charlie Chase __________________________________________________________________________ lonely night for fun I calculate Pythagorean triples Marita Gargiulo CPS Haiku Chapter August Haiku
\ The Theme for August 2020 was family traditions scrubbing her back with a soapy washcloth – work before play Charlie Chase the little boy wiggles his loose tooth a pillow Joan Chaput summer rain drops down pane like tears virus picnic Peter Ulisse babushka tied tight leads all of us like ducklings buying us a treat Patti Fusco From distant Maryland New! Exciting! Exotic... Maiden Aunt is visiting. Patricia C Vener-Saavedra called to dinner-- sisters making fresh mud pies after the summer rain Suzanne Niedzielska blowing the stink off my father in the snow Kat Lehmann Thank you Kat for submitting our first monoku. Tony surprised me by sending the following haibun (haiku with text). Sunday morning smells filled the house of slow cooking tomato sauce in glass mason canning jars retrieved from basement root cellar. Summer tomatoes had been steamed and peeled and crushed into the table mounted grinder. Jars, lids and rubber rings boiled in a large covered pot on the stove. Sometimes a special helper could use the cheese grater, if careful of the danger of sharp edges that can slash knuckles. A couple of weak passes on the grater and Nonnie would take over, somehow always breaking a bite size corner of the hard cheese. Don’t eat too much of this, she would warn of the expensive wedge, if you do you can get worms. Of all the grandchildren, I was the one who still lived with her in the old white house which once held three families of relatives. Sometimes Nonnie would tell the story of the little mouse who stirred the sauce while her family went to church, then fell in. She spoke it in a funny voice, half in Italian, half in English. Frustrated at the Italian parts, not understanding the whole story, I still begged to hear it, over and over, and still long to taste that sauce again. grate parmigiana cheese save a chunk for a topo I can be that mouse Tony Fusco Tony’s haibun inspired me to submit one as well. the Singing Bridge over the Patchogue River - still carries a tune Marita Gargiulo The bridge on Route 1 in Westbrook has been known by that name since it was built in the 1920’s. I lived close to the bridge when I was a baby and my mother eagerly prompted me to listen to its “song” every time we drove across. I worked in a restaurant next to it when I was in high school. The State of Connecticut tried to rename it after someone in Hartford they thought was important ... but the town of Westbrook revolted and in 2017 it was finally officially given its well-deserved name. 
Michele Furnaros
Beautiful Woman -after Leonardo da Vinci Head of a Woman You sit, looking towards the ground, your curls tousled in shades of brilliant amber. Your face shows modesty and your eyes look bashful. Someone is nearby and he’s making you blush. You hold in your laughter, because a woman never wants to seem too eager, or longing for desire. You dare not look up and let him peek at the angelic beauty that you veil from him. Your heart races as he gazes desiring you, wondering what he’s thinking, as he never looks away. You hold your breath as he takes a step closer, leans down, and brushes his lips across your face. Your lip’s part as you inhale, and he whispers in your ear, “Sei la donna più bella.” (You are the most beautiful.) Your heart warms making a tear like pearl form in your eye that you never let him see as you sit frozen like stone. Gold Fever
by Pajoe Amazon Rain Forest, 2022 Gold fever It’s drifting in the tropical breeze. Gold fever They say that mercury Now flows in those old-growth trees. For there’s big yellow lodes of metal Found beneath the ground below: Dig it out and weigh it up to peddle. Gold fever is giving off a real rich glow. Gold fever Hear the jingle in the jungle As ancient earth gets reworked over-- Hey, the company should make a bundle Mining by this strip disease. So we’re all backed up here with blood Money, counting these monetary notes And our feet are stuck in waste-colored mud Where we’re bound to be past anecdotes. Gold fever It’s drifting in the tropical breeze. Gold fever They say that mercury Now flows in those old-growth trees. |